NEBO Om; Nepal, Nabo), a city of the Gadites east of the Jordan, grouped with Heshbon, Elealah, and Baal-meon (Num. xxxii. 3, 38), and therefore situated on the Mishor, or plateau of Moab. The other three towns have been identified; they lie within a few miles of each other at the head of Wady Hesban; and it may be inferred that Nebo was not far distant. Some three or four miles west of Heshbon, on the southern brow of the wady, are traces of ancient ruins, which may per haps mark the site of this old city, though the name appears to be lost. Nebo was rebuilt by the Gadites; but it would seem from i Chron. v. 8 that both it and Baal-meon were inhabited by a Reubenite family; or perhaps that family held the country up to the borders of Nebo and Baal-meon. At a later period it was captured by the Moabites, and the prophet Isaiah joins it with Dibon and Medeba, in the curse pronounced upon that land (xv. 2). Jeremiah likewise predicts its destruction as one of the cities of Moab (xlviii. I; 22). Euse bins and Jerome mention this city, and locate it eight miles south of Heshbon; stating that in their day it was deserted though still retaining its old name (Onomast., s. v. Nabo). They confound it, however, with Kenath, a city of Argob in Bashan, which was captured by Nobah the Manassite, and called Nobah. That city, as has been shown (KENATtI), was situated in the mountains near the eastern boundary of Bashan. There was no con nection whatever between Nobah the Manassite, and Nebo a city of Moab. It does not appear from the sacred writers whether the mountain and city of Nebo were near each other; according to Eusebius they must have been some ten miles apart, for he places the former six miles west, and the latter eight miles south of Heshbon. Moses joins Nebo and Baal-meon, and Isaiah joins Nebo and Mcdeba (Deut. xxxii. 38; Is. xv. 2). Now Baal-meon is two miles south, and Medeha four miles south-east of Heshbon ; it may therefore he , concluded that Nebo was in the same locality, and thus not far distant from the mountain of the same name.
2. In Ezra ii. 29, in the list of those who re turned from the captivity in Babylon, we read, The children of Nebo, fifty and two.' That Nebo was a town and not a man, is evident from the context; and it would seem that the town was situated in the tribe of Benjamin; as before it are Ramah, Gaba, Michmas, Bethel, and Ai, and after it Lod and Ono—all of which were towns of Ben jamin. With the exception of the similar lists in chap. x. 43, and Neh. vii. 33, the name does not occur elsewhere. Nebo may have been an obscure village of Benjamin ; or it may have risen to im portance before the captivity ; or some colony of Benjamites may have crossed the Jordan at an early period and settled in Nebo of Moab, and on their return from Babylon may have called their new residence by the name of the town they had occupied. Be this as it may, there is now a small village called Belt Nz3bah in the plain of Sharon, at the foot of the hills of Benjamin, a few miles west of Beth-horon, which is doubtless identical with the Nebo of Ezra. This appears to be the place referred to by Jerome as Nobe or A7IA (Epist. ad Eusloch., Opera, i. 69o, ed. Migne Onamast., s. v. Anob). But it became celebrated in the time of the Crusades as the site of Castellum Arnala'i, built by the Patriarch of Jerusalem to defend the road to the holy city (Will. Tyr. xiv. 8). It was afterwards visited by Richard of England in A. D. 1192 (Robinson, B. R., ii. 254; Handbook, p. 286). Though this village was twice seen by Dr. Robinson, and recognised as the Nobe or Jerome and the crusades, yet he does not appear to have identified it with the Nebo of Benjamin. J. L. P.